Zoot Suit and Other Plays by Luis Valdez

During this time, Valdez founded the first Chicano theatrical organization in the United States: El Teatro Campensino.Įl Teatro Campensino, translated to 'the farm worker's theatre,' produced works in both English and Spanish. In 1965, Valdez returned to Delano, California to join Cesar Chavez and the movement for farm worker unionization. While working with this group, he discovered guerilla and agitprop theatre, which would become vital in his development of Chicano theatre. Following his graduation, he joined the San Fransisco Mime Troupe.

In the early 1960s, Valdez attended San Jose State University. By the time he reached high school, Valdez was an active member of his school's theatre program, as well as the speech and debate club. Within the migrant camps, despite moving so much, Valdez began telling stories and putting on puppet shows. As a child, he began working in the fields alongside his family. Luis Valdez, the most recognized and celebrated Hispanic playwright of our times, is the director of the famous farm-worker theater, El Teatro Campesino.Born to farmworkers in California, Luis Valdez's upbringing profoundly shaped his artistic, social, and political views.

Jorge Huerta of the University of California-San Diego. The anthology also includes an introduction by noted theater critic Dr. This collection contains three of playwright and screenwriter Luis Valdez’s most important and recognized plays: Zoot Suit, Bandido! and I Don’t Have to Show You No Stinking Badges.

Valdez’s cadre of young urban characters struggle with the stereotypes and generalizations of America’s dominant culture, the questions of assimilation and patriotism, and a desire to rebel against the mainstream pressures that threaten to wipe them out.Įxperimenting with brash forms of narration, pop culture of the war era, and complex characterizations, this quintessential exploration of the Mexican-American experience in the United States during the 1940’s was the first, and only, Chicano play to open on Broadway. From the moment the myth-infused character El Pachuco burst onto the stage, cutting his way through the drop curtain with a switchblade, Luis Valdez spurred a revolution in Chicano theater.įocusing on the events surrounding the Sleepy Lagoon Murder Trial of 1942 and the ensuing Zoot Suit Riots that turned Los Angeles into a bloody war zone, this is a gritty and vivid depiction of the horrifying violence and racism suffered by young Mexican Americans on the home front during World War II. This critically acclaimed play by Luis Valdez cracks open the depiction of Chicanos on stage, challenging viewers to revisit a troubled moment in our nation’s history.

Zoot Suit and Other Plays by Luis Valdez